This is an entry that i wrote last year but forgot to clean up and click publish. Last night, while sitting in shul watching a different Rabbi’s sermon about HOME and HOPE, this old entry resurfaced in my mind and i found it and dusted it off for u to come and see.

9/22/2010 Written (one year ago)

We have just recently finished high holidays and i did alot of soul searching. While i am not Jewish – i attend Rosh Hashanna and Yom Kippur services with my family and this year since the kids decided they were old enuf to fast – i fasted as well.

The Rabbi’s sermon on Yom Kippur was particularly powerful and troubling as he spoke about Anti-Zionism being a new face / front for Antisemitism. It reminded me of Rabbi Seixas letter to George Washington so many years ago re: a government that to “bigotry gives no sanction, to persecution no assistance.” It was such a good phrase and so in sync with our founding principles that George re-used the phrase in his returned correspondence.

Its a phrase i think of often. It kinda fits with my other favorite phrase from Gandhi “whatever you do may seem insignificant, but it is most significant you do it.”

I think the two thoughts come to me mind as i begin this new year because they present a call to duty – the “heal the world” to tikkun olam when i’d rather just be an ostrich. I’d rather not know of these deep internal strife amongst Jewish people. I’d rather not reflect on the growing antisemitism and anti-Islam in Europe. I’d rather not have to answer our youngster’s question on the walk home

“will there be another Holocaust?”

or when we break the fast “will there be another Holocaust?”

or at bed time “where there be another Holocaust?”

Each time – a bit of a different answer came forward.

To the first one – “no there will not”

(because this is what i want to believe and because denile is a mighty big river in Egypt)

to the 2nd time – “there have been Holocausts since that one – you know there has – so it is possible. Yes it is possible. No one believed it was posssible 60 + years ago and still some today work hard to deny it was ever true. So, yes, my darling it is possible.”

to the 3rd time – “only if we allow it”

as our Rabbi said: “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” (Burke)

And then the call to stand in this place of tension and to realize:

According to Rabbi Bunim of P’shiskha, everyone should have two pockets, each containing a slip of paper. On one should be written: I am but dust and ashes, and on the other: The world was created for me. From time to time we must reach into one pocket, or the other. The secret of living comes from knowing when to reach into each.

And to know that in forging a balance within this place of tension, we become whole. And as a different Rabbi told us at a different service several years before – the word Shalom, which is Hebrew generally translated as Peace, is actually “to be complete, perfect, whole or full”

and as another clergy from another time told us: (bold added by me)

We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was “legal” and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was “illegal.” It was “illegal” to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler’s Germany.

Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country’s antireligious laws.

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality.Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

this PR Newswire is announcing a special Closed Door National Think Tank to discuss and help to determine the future of Deaf Education

did i mention its behind closed doors – FUN FUN FUN.

the full-day session on Thursday will bring together a steering committee who will work to identify the challenges in deaf education today, acknowledge some of the vastly different educational methodologies in the area, and begin what is hoped will be a long-term collaboration to develop and advocate for models and funding to appropriately address the differing educational needs of over 37 million children in the United States who are deaf or hard of hearing.

and we r not invited. who is invited, u ask? well…

Esteemed professionals participating in the think-tank include government representatives from the State of Illinois and the State of Virginia, as well as participants from other state governmental agencies, leaders of relevant NGOs, educators and administrators from the Illinois Public Schools and other public and private schools for the deaf, mental health professionals and medical doctors.

hope they have fun plotting out our future with so very very very few of us at the table

And look no mentioned of bilingualism at all – hmmmmm odd eh. speech (ie spoken language) and listening are mention many times. go figure – lets over emphasize what Deaf folks can’t naturally do and under emphasize what they can do successfully and well and package it all as if this is NEW and news worthy.

Oh and check out the conference on Literacy that Clarke School for HEARING and SPEECH is hosting in Oct

(thanks for this link S) See the sponsors? (yes yes folks i see that NTID and Gallaudet are sponsors but PAY ATTENTION TO THE BIG GUNS TOO see more below) click the program brochure and check out all the folks offering CEU credits (ASHA, RID, AG Bell academy, CT state dept of education), Keynote is president of AG Bell Association (Treni), sessions on Auditory Verbal Therapy (AVT), habilitation. independence, LSLS certificaiton, oh and ONE on literacy – phew! ONE as in uno. They probably had to throw that one in there otherwise the conference title would be false advertising

Oticon Pediatrics

A “People First” Philosophy for Children

Oticon’s pediatric philosophy reflects our commitment to offering children with hearing loss every opportunity to realize their full potential. By addressing their needs with child-friendly solutions we can lay a solid foundation for learning, which will empower them to communicate freely, interact naturally and participate actively in life. This is what Oticon’s People’s First promise is all about.

wow did you see those Oticon’s People First promises? I’ll repeat them here since we r all just beginning to wake up: “communicate freely, interact naturally and participate actively in life.”

As u can see from Oticon Pediatrics website they are in the business of listening devices and further reading indicates that the promises will be fulfilled via the false propaganda that listening and talking set you free.

Another disturbing thing about the Oticon’s “People First” with a focus on the child is that this kinda sounds like the Conference of Educational Administrators of Schools and Programs for the Deaf (CEASD)’s “Child First” Campaign (see pdf Tucker’s Column at bottom of this blog entry) The CEASD Child First is about giving the child accessible and equitable environments and language access etc where as the National Think Tank at top, the Clarke “Literacy” conference and the Oticon Pediatrics “People First” are all fixed on the fixing of Deaf children

boo

aint we been there done that?

and aint it odd how they keep stealing our language meaning – ASL is a LANGUAGE

so now they are playing up Oralism (oral / aural ONLY) to be a language when it is a modality and a method hmmm – spin anyone

so now they call it Spoken Language and AVT they now call LSL which kinda looks like ASL eh?

AVT was a bit more honest in name – auditory verbal therapy and Listening and Spoken Language is a bit bogus

whatever they wanna call all this jazz – it is a tune that has been sung and strung out with FAILING results

sure some Deaf folks sing and listen and dance and prance but by and large most of the folks find their way to sign language by the end of the day and say HEY why was i denied this stuff – its mighty handy and dandy

WHY indeed?

cha ching

what’s that i hear? ahhh the sound of a cash register and some CEU points being racked up

Soon maybe ill blog about how some of the latest studies on CI with the wee babies are showing that their brains are NOT working similar to hearing babies – hmmmm. this is a pickle aint it cuz all the HUGE push is to make them the SAME in the hopes of making them EQUAL (which is the biggest falsehood and the main culprit of oppression – same does NOT equal =. Not if we hold these truths that all folks were created equal – no matter the color of their skin, if their chromosome be XY or XX, if they love the same sex or not, if they worship a different God or not or none at all, and if they be Deaf or not – they still all be EQUAL)

but what do i know – im just a child of a lesser god, eh?

don’t dismay folks – ASL and Deaf culture are on the rise – they are hitting popular culture and that is what is making all the white coats and companies spin faster. Once ASL and Deaf culture breakthrough and are accepted and the majority tell the oppressors we think it is ok to be Deaf well then they be in a pickle and they no want that so they gonna keep spinning and falsifying stuff and we keep singing the truth and ….

STANDing UP (not by)

but first….

ya gotta WAKE UP. I love ya – lets jump at da sun. We might not reach it but at least we will get off the ground or… u can do nothing or peck at our own – the choice is each and all of ours.

From the Liberal Party of New Foundland’s People’s Program book (p. 49)

SCHOOL FOR THE DEAFA New Liberal Government will re-open the School for the Deaf, over a two-year period, working closely with parents and related groups and organizations.

Hopefully the Liberal Party will win the fall election and then within 2 years NSD will re-open. Maybe it would even offer a course in Maritime Sign Language.

The reopening of the school is very important because the school was earmarked by a doctor as being one of the pillars of keeping Deaf culture and sign language alive and thus something to be done away with in the push to eradicate deafness –

NOTE 2: speaking and listening is fine – excluding ASL from a Deaf child’s education and family is not. billing listening and talking as the path to independence is not fine and saying it can only be achieved by an exclusionary means necessary is not right, just, good or true.

so i google AG Bell Association Components of a Quality Auditory-Oral program and am a bit freaked out. I mean it is hard core and the fact that the John Tracy Clinic STILL requires that its applicants be involved with schools that adhere to this manifesto – well yikes!

This obsessive mandate that everyBODY must be committed to the auditory/oral philosophy – family and extended family, administrators, general education staff, board of education and the community – Wow! so much for respecting various languages and ways of communicating.

Oralism is King it seems.

Haven’t we done been there, done that before – AG Bell Assoc? Or didnt you get the Babbidge report or the COED report or the ICED 2010 New Era Agreement and Accord of the Future or the more recent reports that show that while cochlear implanting is on the raise – most Deaf kids make their way to sign language by adolescence.

Audism is King in this document also.

according to AG Bell Association Public School Caucus Components of a Quality Auditory-Oral program – (page 7) (bold added by me)

Audition is:

the natural foundation for all learning,

the best avenue for receiving and developing spoken language

the best avenue for developing speech production,

the most expedient avenue for receiving information, and

the system that warns us of impending danger.

wow wee!!!!!

Lots of creepy stuff about Early Identification / Intervention and LRE in this document too.

AG Bell Association Position Paper on Cochlear Implants

http://agbell.org/NetCommunity/Page.aspx?pid=541 (no idea why AG Bell Association’s server is down. Let’s not assume its to erase their paper trail re: offensive Pepsi letter, bylaws prohibiting propaganda and lobbying, this position paper, and much much more. lets just assume the best – that its simply a technical malfunction. technology does break sometimes – just check out all the CI recalls and all the ones that have stopped working that are still in folks’ heads) Now back to CI in children and AG Bell’s position statement –

1st line in this doc. is the forever tooted AG Bell mission of promoting the falsehood of independence comes from listening and talking and the 2nd sentence reads

“Cochlear implants for children with hearing loss, combined with appropriate habilitation, can provide a key to making that independence achievable.“

Ah hmmmmm well how come so many Deaf kids with CIs grow up later to use sign language? and what of the Deaf kids who do not have CI or habilitation – are they never going to achieve independence?

the position paper mentions the “efficacy” (the things turn on and off) and not the “EFFECTIVENESS”

it also states:

“Auditory learning integrated with social, emotional and cognitive development is crucial to proficiency in the use of spoken language.“

Wow, how did Deaf folks ever learn to talk before there were cochlear implants? from this position paper, it looks like it would be impossible to do without all this stuff but we do know that many Deaf folks do speak and many of them have never had cochlear implants so…. hmmmm

“It is now appropriate for children to receive implants at a very young age. This trend has been reinforced by the accurate and early diagnosis of hearing loss.“

Is it appropriate for doctors to be performing bilateral implant surgery on 5 month old babies when the FDA recommends 12 mo old and up?

And again the push for early detection appears to be for the purpose of early implantation. hmmmm

“Current research further substantiates that children who receive implant(s) at an early age can demonstrate impressive growth in spoken language and literacy achievement comparable to the levels of their peers with typical hearing.“

Shouldn’t they be citing the source of this research? I hope they are not referring to that one single study in Australia with a small N that was funded by biased systems and COCHLEAR the co.

If cochlear implants and AVT/LSL are to be credited for independence and speech and literacy abilities then shall they also be faulted when a cochlear implant dies or has to be explanted or when speech and literacy skills are not up to par?

Odd that they don’t mention the language skills and literacy abilities of Deaf children who got a fully natural and accessible sign language at birth up or the study that shows ASL actually helps Deaf children’s speech or the study of how by elementary school Deaf kids shift from oral / aural only programs and into signing programs.

“Cochlear implant technology brings with it a responsibility to support this new access to sound. An appropriate educational intervention program optimizes the integration of auditory learning with spoken language and literacy skills.”

This is just a fancy way of saying oral / aural ONLY programs. They don’t say oral so much no more on their website cuz ya get some mighty dirty pictures when you key in the word “oral” for a google search

hmmm and I wonder what educational intervention program they have in mind?

perhaps the AG Bell academy AVT/LSL program that has not yielded consistent or reliable results or the much sought after independence as the recipients of cochlear implants and AVT and oral / aural only education often still prefer visual access to information ie captioning for TV, subtitles for films, text messaging, CART, etc (even Rush Limbaugh who was hearing his whole LONG life until very recently “depends” on captioning and one on one conversations without background noise.

– folks might also want to check out the House Ear Research Institute founded by the famous Dr. House – one of the earliest cochlear implant surgeons in the U.S. The House Ear Research Institute is the top banner on the AG Bell Association website – scroll down on the Pros and Cons of Effective Teaching page at the House Ear Research Institute and see how visual acuity is discouraged and oral / auditory is overly encouraged http://www.hei.org/care/education/evaluating-teachers.html

The day after or day of (depends on what part of the world you are standing in) COCHLEAR co. announced the recall of its CI500 range cochlear implants due to an increase in some of them up and quitting for no apparent reason, Med-El announced that it has the FDA approval to market its new cochlear implant and Sonova announced the FDA re-approval of their formerly recalled HI-Res 90K cochlear implant for U.S. markets.

Meanwhile the FDA does not list the Advanced Bionics 2010 recall of the HI-Res 90K cochlear implant for failing hot or the COCHLEAR co. CI500 range cochlear implant recall.

“a new design that is built to last a lifetime.”

More propaganda, falsehoods and lies

so we now see deceit is not so sweet

COCHLEAR co. billed their CI500 range as “a new design that is built to last a lifetime.” See this article from the Associated Press in the Chicago-Sun times but in FACT they didnt even last a few years for some folks.

’tis a pity, a shame and reckless that the Food and Drug Administration fails to list the COCHLEAR co. worldwide recall of its CI500 range implants

’tis a pity, a shame and reckless that the Food and Drug Administration fails to list last years Advanced Bionics (one of AG Bell Assoc. other Circle Alliance partners) recall last year of its Hi-Res 90K cochlear implant due to it failing hot

’tis a pity that the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD), which is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and which is involved in EHDI – Early Hearing Detection Intervention fails to have ANYTHING up about recalls – see http://www.nidcd.nih.gov/health/hearing/coch.asp

Don’t even get me started on the Center for Disease Control (CDC)

more government money at work????

For folks and agencies that keep saying they want to ensure parents have all the information to make informed choices – they fail in the informing area it seems.

’tis a pity that AG Bell Association and their Academy that pushes AVT / LSL – advocate, train, and certify folks in sound and speech therapy and fail to include visual acuity and signed language

’tis a pity that COCHLEAR Americas and Advanced Bionics were one of A G Bell’s Circle Alliance Partners and also financed the AG Bell Association Cochlear Implant Fellowship program but both companies have recalls and been fined for failing to follow ethics and failing produce reliable and safe devices

’tis a relief that the AG Bell Association alerted folks to the COCHLEAR recall in their recent email update. thank you AG Bell Assoc for doing that [boo – in the same update they also advertise a summit on cell regeneration – yikes]

While all the initial news about the COCHLEAR co recall was via the articles reporting on the stock plummeting, we will have to see if the regular media will begin to ask the hard questions instead of all the glowing and shinny articles about the “miracle”

questions like:

1. how does one recall something that is in the head and stimulates parts of the brain

NOTE: the recall is only for the UNIMPLANTED COCHLEAR CI500 range devices

If someone has one already implanted and it is working – COCHLEAR co. says leave well enuf alone.

If someone has one already implanted and it is NOT working – COCHLEAR co. says they can get it explanted and be reimplanted with an older type of CI known as “Freedom.”

2. Why the sudden raise in CI500 range just up and quitting inside the head – that is mighty odd and signifies a significant design problem? Clearly the things are not built for life and clearly it is not so easy to determine what went wrong and what will work and won’t unless you can test it INSIDE of someone.

3. How do the 5 month old, 7 month old, 12 month old etc infants indicate to their parents that their implants are not working?

4. What happens to the infant and child that no longer has a working CI but whose parents have committed the child to being oral /aural only – what happens for the weeks and month before the explanting and reimplanting can be rescheduled – are there any provisions in place to provide the child and family with a fully natural and accessible signed language? And why isnt that already provided as CI do not work consistently, reliably, or effectively for everybody always and a fully natural and accessible signed language has proven to help not harm and has been declared to be a fundamental human right?

5. There are more questions the media should be asking like – why haven’t, we the media, done more stories about some of the deaths caused as a result of cochlear implant surgery, some of the less than rosy results, and how many folks have stopped using their cochlear implants? Why do we, the media, just cover the moment of implantation and the mapping session and the “miracle” and/or the Deaf community’s concerns about cochlear implants but almost NEVER interview a Deaf person who later rejected their cochlear implant(s) or who had an adverse experience with cochlear implants? Ya know in the spirit of “the truth and nothing but the truth” and “journalistic integrity”

And when a cochlear implant which cost on average $50,000 – $80,000 for parts, installation, and therapy etc breaks on the inside, a recall is not as easy as taking your car into the shop.

The complications, risks, and hardships of getting a working replacement are not as easy as being given a loaner or a rental car either.

When a cochlear implant dies, the options are:

leave the dead part in the head and hope no leakage, scar tissue, infection, magnet moving, skin erosion or anything like that crops up 10 – 20 – 30 years down the line

– NOTE: leaving it dead in the head also means leaving the person Deaf and for some folks that is totally not an option. There is the other ear and the brain stem but you get the point – for some folks once is enuf.

or explant the dead cochlear implant (i dont know if the term explant has made it into the printed dictionary but it is a term that is used in the medical world and it just means to take the thingy out of the body – the opposite of implant)

there are numerous dangers with explanting

of great concern is – there will be an extended period of time in which the infant and child is not getting auditory stimulation and is not getting any VISUAL stimulation in terms of LANGUAGE because they system often pushes ORAL (no signing) / AURAL (no signing) ONLY

thus leaving the child completely deprived of any language input when there is a perfectly good language being gobbled up by hearing babies and their hearing mummies and daddies all over the US – ie signed language and in the US of A that is American Sign language

Hopefully parents will know to give their Deaf children ASL no matter if they choose an implant or not but with the raise of Option Schools and Oral only education and the huge push to implant at 5 mo (against FDA recommendations) and all the big $$ behind the cochlear implant industry, the “profession” of audiology and speech pathology and all the government money spent on hearing detection and not on LANGUAGE introduction – well… we gotta do more than just hope, don’t we folks?

Also of note is how these notable agencies which influence legislation, funding, and intervention (FDA, CDC, NIH NIDCD, NCMAM, and AG Bell Association) fail to mention or make note of the FACT that four major world organizations have declared the importance of a fully natural and accessible signed language for Deaf kids. Language deprivation is NOT COOL cuz it leads to language deprivation and that is a denial of language rights and human rights.

World Health Organization,

United Nations – Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities,

World Federation of the Deaf,

International Congress on the Education of the Deaf New Era and Accord for the Future Agreement 2010)

So before the systems that have been pushing oral /aural ONLYism have hidden behind the cloak of how grand and great cochlear implants are, how implanting babies before they are one will result in them being near hearing like and thus no spoken language delay, how successful listening and speaking makes a person, and how parental rights and informed choices are all the rage but we continually see this is UTTERLY false – we see how they have been pulling all the strings behind the curtain to deny children the right to a fully natural and accessible signed language and how these agencies are failing to sayiANYTHING when the magic bullet makers fail – when cochlear implant companies are sued, fined, their products spark, fail HOT, get recalled, their stock plummets, their wares are taken out of the warehouses and hospital shelves and meanwhile the parents and the kids are left with NOTHING but hollow and shallow promises. hmmm – dont seem right does it?

nice job US government – sure keep covering those ever expensive devices via medicaid and medicare (which is about to get a major hit) cuz you will still need to cover the 2nd one and the replacement and the therapy and the CART and the interpreter and the captioning and the…… and it still will not be enough – so much for your cost saving plan.

This is where someone will pop up to say stem cells, laser treatment, the new pill they are working on to which we will say – SIDE EFFECTS! Geez folks – WAKE UP!

and meanwhile – there aint really nothing wrong with being Deaf ya know.

That is the most important truth they dont want ya ever to discover. Its dandy to be Deaf and its handy to be an ASLer and if you wanna add that other jazz – talking, and singing, and dancing, and listening – im cool with that. Just dont EXCLUDE equailty of condition and dont EXCLUDE justice. (it is not just, right, good, ethical, wise, prudent, effective etc to deny a Deaf infant and child the right to a fully natural and accessible signed language)

apparently cochlear implants are not just a hot & cold failure commodity in stock but they are also in blogsite traffic. The visits to this site soared as COCHLEAR co’s stock plummeted – hmmm?

seems folks r hungry for the truth

Knowledge is power folks

(note Oralism was also declared to be a failure so i have NO idea why the system of EHDI is still pushing the labeling of a newborn as having FAILED the hearing test – the newborn and family is being FRAMED into a deficit model from the onset – they even have brochures where the hospital will X a box that says = Your baby has failed their hearing test – and send the parents home with that. RUDE beyond RUDE. especially when i have been meeting several parents who say they were FINE when they learned their baby was Deaf -they were like – “sign me up for sign language classes NOW and cool she cant hear SSHHHHHH. that means she wont hear my cuss words.” yep not everyone treats the news of baby deaf as a death sentence and not everyone plummets into despair and grief. some folks do say cool beans and ASL rocks and maybe we will do some of that other stuff too – its our option but first and foremost we gonna love up our newborn and say welcome and we love you as is and we will say it in a language s/he does not have to work for.

pssst – it is NOT the newborns, infants, children, or even adults who become deaf that are the failures – it is they system that continually portrays being Deaf as a malady, infirmity, affliction, disorder, disease (see CDC and NIH).

Many moons ago women were saddled with the falsehoods of being the “weaker sex,” African-Americans were “intellectually inferior,” gays and lesbians were “a psychological illness” when in FACT they were none of those things – they were and are fine. Society just needed an attitude adjustment.

thus far the SYSTEMS of TREATING Deaf folks have FAILED because they treat them as an illness instead of as a PEOPLE. And that is not cool ya basta with that crap already ya all. Get with the program – it is ok to be Deaf – it is just NOT ok to be oppressed.

Truth and Soul Force rock and roll and always win

STAND tall and long folks for the truth and for love.

To all the families who have been or are or will be adversely impacted by problems with cochlear implants, my heart goes out to you. To all the folks i know and love who have cochlear implants and/or have chosen them for their children – you fine no worries. We are examining the system – not your choices but rather how and what information the systems provides you with and what they DON’T provide you with and WHY.

re: the Cochlear Implant industry – somone in the previous CI thread comments said the CEOs at COCHLEAR got their bonuses before they announced the recall – not sure if that is fact or fiction but we do know from Eron and other big business greed and corporate deviance does breed alot of failure in moral reasoning skills and ’tis a pity because attached to those cochlear implants are humans and they deserve first and foremost to know – they are loved and lovely as is and to be told this in a language they can fully understand and access regardless of whether or not their cochlear implant is working.

NOTE: ASADV is an important Rochester, NY based organizations – not only does it provide direct service to victims of relationship violence, it also provides prevention workshops, training, advocacy, and has established some traditions for fundraising and awareness – Family Fun Day being one of my favorite ones. In a word – ASADV is GREAT. However, there are plans to change the name against the wishes of the founders and members of ASADV – Sharon Haynes, Vicki T. Hurwitz, Beth Metlay, Martina Moore-Reid, Sharon Staehle, Mary Mowl, and Deirdre Schlehofer.

I know each of these wonderful Deaf women personally and they would never take this STAND wrongfully. As their just and good letter spells out there is no need or cause for changing the name and the problems that will come with doing so are abundant.

Save the name of ASADV!

Dear Rochester Community,

Last June, the Board and the Executive Director of Advocacy Services for Abused Deaf Victims (ASADV) informed us as the co-founders that they decided it would be most beneficial for them to change the name from Advocacy Services for Abused Deaf Victims (ASADV) to DeafPEACE (Deaf Prevention Education Advocacy Community Empowerment). They are considering renaming DeafPEACE, without consulting the Deaf community, the community they are supposed to represent. The name DeafPEACEsuggests a peaceful approach toward the Deaf without special reference to violence or abuse. First, abused persons are victims. Second, they are survivors. But not all victims are survivors.

To support the values of openness, transparency and community involvement, we believe in engaging YOU for feedback on the important issue. We are writing to ask for your support to keep the name ASADV.

The Board and the Executive Director further stated, “…a name that is more contemporary, and in alignment with the work in the broader domestic field, will position us well as we look forward to move the agency to new levels. We want a name that reflects gender-neutrality, does not have the word “victim” in it especially seeing that the term used these days is “survivor,” unless it pertains to a fatality, and is easy to remember, spell and sign. Such change will allow us to gain more recognition and visibility within the deaf community and with local, state and national organizations as we continue to seek new funding sources to sustain and grow our agency.”

From 1998 to 2009, we built up ASADV from the ground up with the training support from Seattle’s Abused Deaf Women Advocacy Services (ADWAS) founded by Marilyn J. Smith in 1986 and monetary support from the Deaf Women of Rochester (DWR). In a historic moment, we received two federal grants under the name of ASADV resulting in the hiring of an Executive Director and a volunteer coordinator as full-time salaried staff to ensure service quality to deaf and hard-of-hearing victims who need advocacy. This action plan has been a result of 11 years’ hard work and fundraising efforts, so ASADV was turned over to the new board in good hands. Their letter also stated, “It is our desire to have a community event where we announce our new name and re-introduce ourselves to the community.”

Our sister agencies modeled after Seattle’s ADWAS have never changed their names once they were founded. Why is it important to re-name ASADV now while it is already in existence and well-known by the Rochester community, service agencies and local/state/national organizations? Instead ASADV should spend time and energy into making sure the funding continues each consecutive year. ASADV is a member of the Justice for Deaf Victims National Coalition (JDVNC). It is a national coalition, which is comprised of all sister agencies serving Deaf victims. The Office for Victims of Crime has provided scholarships for state, local and community-based victim service providers to attend JDVNC’s conference. The US Department of Justice: Office on Violence against Women funds many grant programs.

Please take action on this important issue and express your concerns through DeafTimes. Feel free to post this letter to other links.

We urge you to sign NO to name change!

We feel that ASADV’s history with its name intact should continue. Your support during the early years for ASADV is valued and appreciated by co-founders, the former board members and us.